


Optimus Reim: The Capitals' Curse

by MeansToOffend (goodmorning)



Series: Optimus Reim, Cursebreaker, and Other Magic Goalies [3]
Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: 2016-2017 NHL Season, 2017 NHL Playoffs, Alternate Universe - Magical Realism, Crack, Crack Played Slightly Straighter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-19
Updated: 2017-05-19
Packaged: 2018-11-02 16:07:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10947996
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goodmorning/pseuds/MeansToOffend
Summary: When a decades-long playoff curse comes to the Capitals' attention, what magic goalie can even hope to help them?Optimus Reim!Or:“'I didn’t realise the curse wasreal,' says McElhinney, shaking Holts' hand, andwhat?"





	Optimus Reim: The Capitals' Curse

After a long winter, the bald eagles return to the east coast of the US, seeking out the wetlands that are their summer homes. In the DC area, an eagle sits atop a tall cottonwood, glancing sharply around himself before stretching his wings and gliding below the canopy. He alights on a low branch; a moment later, a porcupine makes his slow and sleepy way down the tree, in need of a drink from the nearby river. A beaver dives in, propelling himself upstream and climbing atop a dam. A turtle plops from the dam into the water; a bass leaps; a mockingbird flits to the riverbank and shivers water down its feathers. A deer, muzzle dripping, raises his head, his velveted antlers just beginning to grow. He canters to the edge of the trees, wandering through backyards until he reaches one with two people sitting on the back porch. The smell of tea is in the humid air, and the deer snorts once, tossing his head. 

Braden Holtby crosses the yard to join his wife and the rookie at the table. “All packed?” he asks, and smiles as Walks insists that it was only a visit. “This time,” the Holtbeast says, and they all smile.

It’s become a tradition of his to center himself on gamedays like this, to enjoy the peace that comes with being animals, to exhaust his magic enough that the adrenaline won’t wake it. It’s even more important on days like today, when the playoffs are starting, when he doesn’t feel 100% like himself and the idea of making it past even the first round seems impossible.

\--

Toronto is supposed to be easy. Holts knows everyone expects them to sweep this series for some reason, but he remembers their first two regular-season games against them and thinks it probably won’t be that simple.

\--

They barely win the first game. They barely lose the next two. The Holtbeast slips out of their hotel in the middle of Toronto and becomes a fox. He doesn’t want to have to think about it.

\--

If the fourth game is close, at least it doesn’t require overtime. When they fly out that night, he spends the trip as a greyhound, laying across Ovi and Backy as they murmur above him. If he were to focus on the words he could understand them, but he doesn’t want to focus; he wants to feel like a greyhound, like his muscles are a coiled spring ready to launch him full speed away from the pit in his stomach.

\--

After the fifth he knows he could have done better. He can’t settle down on the plane back to Toronto the next day, shifting from hawk to heron to hummingbird, swooping and stalking and hovering until everyone else looks as on edge as he is. He shouts as a limpkin, as a loon, and, when Backy herds him into the bathroom, he becomes a lyrebird, letting out the sounds of alarms and chainsaws.

“Is everything alright?” Backy asks him, and once he’s focused long enough to understand it the Holtbeast goes human again so he can answer.

“Not really,” he says, and becomes a tabby cat. In this form he can hear Ovi outside the door, telling Burky and Kuzy and Wilso to sit down and not worry about it, and he purrs, leaping from floor to sink to Backy’s shoulders and draping himself over them. By the game the next day, he feels much better.

\--

He intends to apologise after the game, but a series of less-than-ideal events end up conspiring to make him forget.

First the puck takes a weird bounce straight to Matthews and straight past him, and he feels the itch in his brain, his magic tugging at him from below his sternum. It wants _big_ , and _teeth_ , and _claws_ , and he hasn’t had to wrestle down the change in mid-game since he was 22, but here he is trying to do it while Kapanen throws a backhand on net like he’s not about to see the opposing goalie turn into a bear in the middle of a fucking game.

But they make it to overtime, and they win it in overtime, and the second thing happens at the end of the handshake line:

“I didn’t realise the curse was _real_ ,” says McElhinney, shaking his hand, and _what?_

\--

“What?” he asks Grubi, pulling him aside in the tunnel.

“I thought you knew!” Grubi says, looking worried.

“How would I know about a curse?” Holts asks, then stops. “No, never mind. Tell me about it instead. Does it look like it was cast by someone you know? What does it do?”

“Well, it’s not mine or my teacher’s or my mother’s, and it doesn’t look like a Greiss curse either. Really it doesn’t even look Deutsch. North America, is my guess. As for what it does...” Grubi looks serious. “It’s meant to fuck with our heads, to make us believe we can’t do this, that no matter what we try, we will always fail. It’s not nice.”

“Shit,” Holts says, because nothing else seems appropriate. “Should we tell the guys?”

“If we tell them, and they fight it, the curse will probably get stronger. I know what I’m fighting and I can’t even beat it. I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

“Shit,” Holts says again, and they don’t say anything else about it.

\--

Holts gets pulled in the second game.

He doesn’t need the curse to feel like a failure.

\--

When they battle back to force a seventh game, the whole team seems to be thinking the same thing: this is the year. This is the time they will finally, finally make the Conference Final, and they’ll do it on home ice, in front of the fans who’ve been waiting and waiting for this moment for almost twenty years.

They come out strong in the first, stronger in the second, and then three of their guys can’t prevent Cole from making a pass that sets up too many passes and there’s only Orlov in front of him and the puck is in the net before Holts even has a chance.

And the team goes limp. They come back for the third and it’s Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, and they’re down by two, and the crowd is quiet, and the team acts like this was inevitable.

They do try, a little, with minutes left, but everything goes wrong and there’s no time and then it’s over and they’ve been shut out - out of the game, out of the playoffs too early yet again.

They salute the fans. Some of them are booing. They probably deserve that.

\--

When they’ve limped down the tunnel, in some cases literally, when they’ve given postgame interviews (“We didn't lose the series tonight, we lost it in the first three games, four games,” Backy says, with technical truth that makes Holts shiver), when they’ve showered and not said a single word to one another, when Trotz has come in, when he tells them they’re better than they played, that he doesn’t know what’s wrong with them, when they hang their heads as he sighs and leaves, Holts catches Backy’s eye and pretends to fiddle with his equipment til it’s just right.

Backy extracts himself and Ovi from their small group of rookies, and makes Ovi sit in Holts’ stall before asking what the issue is.

Holts isn’t sure he wants to tell them, now, not the way they look. Backy, who threads passes through traffic that give goalies fits, who’d screamed at them in Swedish for nearly a full minute before Game 3, looks more tired than Holts can ever remember seeing him. Ovi, whose shot has never made any sense, who had loudly and jovially made awful jokes about the horrific bruising caused by his hamstring injury, looks like a small, sad imitation of the indomitable colossus he usually appears.

But he has to tell them now, so they have time to deal with it before - but hopefully that won’t happen. Still, it has to be dealt with.

“We’re cursed,” he says, simply, “to believe we can’t win.”

“Oh,” says Backy, placing a hand on Ovi’s shoulder to keep him from jumping up.

“Shit,” says Ovi, and makes a call. Several minutes of Russian later, he hangs up and frowns. “Bryz says Russian goalies make curses, not break them. I say, ‘And you?’ and he says, ‘Sanja, you know I have no magic, just a curious mind.’ Then he makes me say hello to his cat.”

“Our goalies, the ones who can do things like that, mostly do wards,” Backy puts in. “There’s Läck, but he’s in Europe right now and I think he mostly does physical curses anyway.”

“And Grubi says this one’s emotional,” Holts finishes. “I don’t know any cursebreakers either, and I’m not sure I like the idea of trying to find one. If we can’t trust-”

“Did you say you need a cursebreaker?” Winny asks from over Holts’ shoulder. The room is nearly empty now, just Burky and Kuzy talking quietly in a corner, Orpik staring despondently at the wall, and Grubi waiting patiently for them to be finished so he doesn’t interrupt. Holts waves him over, because he already knows what this is about so he may as well come get his things.

“You know a cursebreaker?” asks Holts. 

“Yes,” Winny says, slowly.

“A good one?” Backy asks.

“I’m not sure, since I never saw him do it, but I can give you his number.”

“Who is he?” Ovi asks, Backy’s hand still firmly on his shoulder.

“He was one of the goalies on my last team.”

“Bullshit,” says Grubi from his stall because he _apparently_ hasn’t left yet. “Bernier breaks wards, not curses.”

“No, not Bernie. I meant Reims. He’s a new dad but you can ask him to take a couple days and come look at the curse at least. He probably would, he’s a nice guy.”

“Wait, Reimer’s a cursebreaker?” asks Holts, taken aback. As much as he tries not to judge people, he’s still human. When he’s seen Reimer before, the man has always been smiling, always a little awkward, and Holts assumed he was something of a marshmallow. Cursebreakers can’t afford that much softness, he’s been told; they need to know who they are and have the strength to back it up.

Then again, Läck is apparently a cursebreaker.

Maybe some marshmallows have a core of steel.

“I’ll call him tomorrow,” Holts says.

\--

The Holtbeast goes home. When he wakes up in the morning he shaves his face, tips some sugar on the counter, and becomes an ant.

When he’s done, he calls Reimer.

“Hello?” answers a slightly suspicious voice.

“Hi,” says Holts. “It’s, uh, it’s Braden Holtby. From the Washington Capitals? I got your number from Daniel Winnik. I’m sorry to call you, but-”

“It’s a curse?” Reimer asks, like he’s interested in spite of himself.

“...Yes,” says Holts. “And I know you’re busy, but I thought even if you couldn’t help you could maybe recommend someone else?”

“Lu told me Läck breaks curses - oh, but he’s in Europe. No, I don’t know anyone else.”

“Thank you for trying, anyway,” Holts says, sighing.

“That bad? I might be able to get down there for a few days, but if it’s bad I don’t know how much of it I can break in that short of a time.”

“It would still be better than nothing, though.”

“Let me just talk to my wife - her parents are here, to help out, so the timing isn’t terrible, but if she thinks I shouldn’t go…”

“I completely understand,” says Holts, and waits.

“She asked me why I wasn’t already packing,” Reimer says, when he gets back to the phone, “so I guess I’ll see you soon?”

“Send me your flight details, when you know them, and I’ll pick you up at the airport. You’re welcome to stay with my family as well, if you need to?”

“Thanks,” says Reimer.

“Thank you,” Holts tells him.

\--

The Holtbeast is curled up as a cat on his wife’s lap when he remembers he has to tell her about the Reimer thing. When he tells her, head in her lap, that he’s invited a cursebreaker to stay with them for a few days, she gives him a look, waiting until he spills the entire story.

\--

Reimer arrives Friday morning, and Holts picks him up on the way to Kettler, figuring he’ll want to see it for curse reasons and all the guys will be there. He looks exhausted, but Holts isn’t sure if that’s from the flight or the new baby or both. He doesn’t ask; he remembers being asked it himself, exhaustion he hadn’t been noticing before seeping into him with every word.

He’s early, by design, and Reimer pokes around in all the nooks and crannies he can find, but there’s no sign of the curse.

“Sometimes they dissipate really quickly when they’re not active,” he’s saying when Backy walks through the door. “...Or not?” He stares at Backy in horrified fascination.

“So you can see it?” Backy asks.

“Yeah, it, uh, it looks like water. Like you’ve just been outside in the rain. You might actually be able to feel it, if you think about how heavy your clothes get when you try to wear them wet, except it’s in your mind instead of on your clothes.”

He’s rambling, but he makes a hell of a lot of sense to Holts, and apparently to Backy, too, if the appraising look he takes on is any indication.

“Do you think you can break it, then?” he asks.

“I think so,” Reimer replies. “It’s meant seriously and it was obviously cast in anger. Normally those make curses stronger, but this curse is emotional. They’re supposed to be a lot more subtle, so you don’t notice and fight them, and the subtlety makes them weaker. This is the strongest I’ve ever heard of, and I’m guessing that has a lot to do with the length of time it’s been around. It’s probably been on the team for nearly 20 years at this point, and on you specifically for nearly 10; the rookies won’t have it as bad as you do now but they’ll be worse off than you were your first year.”

“I see. How do you-” Backy starts, cutting off when the door opens. Holts isn’t surprised to see that it’s Ovi, limping visibly now, and Backy hurries over to offer him a shoulder to lean on. His hair looks more lank and grey than it ever has, and Holts wonders for a moment whether the curse is harder on him, and if it’s because he’s the captain or because he fights or just because he’s Ovi.

Reimer is obviously shocked, which seems to confirm the first thing, at least. “I’m breaking yours first,” he says, and Ovi seems to notice him for the first time.

“Florida goalie!” he says, grinning almost as brightly as he usually does. “None of our shots get past you!” Reimer blushes, fiddling with his hands, and Ovi barrels on. “Shutout is good enough to be payment for cursebreaking, right?”

“You guys don’t have to pay me,” Reimer says earnestly, hands still in motion. “If I left it, knowing there was something I could have done, I wouldn’t be able to look myself in the face.” He rubs his palms together like he’s dusting off his hands, flicks his fingers like he’s just washed them, squints at Ovi in concentration, and smiles.

“Did you just-?” Ovi asks.

“Yep,” says Reimer, grinning. “If you can get me all the guys who have flights to Worlds coming up, I can do them next.”

“Well, you can start with me,” says Backy, as Ovi focuses on texting Kuzy and Orlov and Holts contacts Grubi. “How did you do that so quickly?”

“The way I break curses is... well, I eat them, basically. Or absorb them. My magic is pretty much like a sponge anyway, so a curse that’s like water is exactly the kind that’s easiest for me to get rid of.”

“I see,” says Backy, and then shivers. “Was that it?”

“That was it,” Reimer confirms, and breaks the curses on all three of the new arrivals and Trotz before they have to hide him from the press.

\--

“Why all of you act like someone died?” Kuzy asks, buoyant and curseless.

Holts knows that’s going to rub some people the wrong way, but he can’t bring himself to care.

\--

Reimer’s broken the curses on the rest of the team within a couple hours, and, grateful, they scatter for the summer.

Holts is driving home when Reimer says, from the passenger seat, “I didn’t break the whole thing, you know.”

“What do you mean?” Holts asks, a little worried.

“It’s hard, with curses that affect the emotions, to trace back to the focus object, especially if it’s not in the building with you.”

“And you don’t think it was?”

“It’s really unlikely. I didn’t feel it there, and it’s probably standing water of some kind given the nature of the curse. I can’t think of any place in a building like that where you could keep any kind of standing water for decades, can you?”

“So what does that mean for us?”

“Well, some of the guys who were called up during the season are probably still cursed, and anybody new you bring in will be. Everyone whose curse I broke today should be fine, though.” He sighs. “I’m sorry I couldn’t do more.”

“You did more than we hoped you could,” Holts tells him. “I’m pretty sure you could dine out on us every time you’re here for the rest of your career.”

“It was really no problem,” Reimer says, and smiles.

\--

Reimer flies out the next day. When the Holtbeast gets home from the airport, he knows he has a lot to think about, a near future to prepare for, a team shakeup he can’t predict, but first...

A cat pads onto the porch of a suburban home. He leaps; a butterfly flits to a rosebush, wings drinking in the sun. A lark skims through the air, calling loud and clear through the sun-dappled forest. A dragonfly dives for a mosquito; a frog leaps into the water; an otter floats peacefully in the river, navigating the current with an occasional lazy swipe of the paw. A great egret stalks the shoreline; a raccoon washes his paws and blinks sleepily in the sun; a squirrel chatters and scolds as he runs up a tree. A hawk takes off from a low branch, powerful wings carrying him above the canopy.

The Holtbeast perches atop a tall cottonwood, glancing around with sharp hawk’s eyes, taking in the beauty of his home, and the worry melts away.

**Author's Note:**

> \- I knew I was going to write a Holtbeast fic in this universe eventually, and then Round 2 happened, so afterwards this happened.  
> \- The action takes place beginning with the playoffs and ending 6 days ago, 2017-05-13.  
> \- All game references are accurate, including Ovi's joke about Optimus' shutout.  
> \- Some of the player quotes are real. There are also references to at least one joke, at least one meme, and at least one RMNB article.  
> \- Ovechkin's English is impressively good, doubly so if you compare him to almost every other Russian in the league.  
> \- The Holtby PoV was an interesting challenge.


End file.
